VERBAL REMEDY

Mixed signals and missing punchlines in the otherwise brilliant THIMBLEWEED PARK

- Matthew Elliott

Friends sob quietly as they lower the coffin of your true love into the damp earth. Above the tears you hear the subsong of crows in the bare November trees. Dignified. Sombre. Then, you hear it. It’s hard to parse at first. But soon, the rhythm and cadence become unmistakable: somebody is armpit-farting Take Five by the Dave Brubeck Quartet, here, at the funeral of your beloved. It’s that wag Thimbleweed Park! *Parp-parp--paparp-parp!*